Big Biz Tycoon Review

Recently, Activision has begun shipping products using its Value Publishing label. These titles are normally from small companies that are unknown and untested in the market. Sold for lower prices than most other games, this is a win-win situation. Activision gets to test new types of products without the expense that a normal contract entails, and the game company gets a slot on the shelves of some of the largest retailers of games in the world.

Big Biz Tycoon may not be the first title released from Activision Value Publishing, but it's the first I have had a chance to pick up and try.

What a piece of crap. I first thought, "How bad can it be? At least it's cheap." Then I started playing it. What a horrible title. If this is what we are in store for from these budget titles, Activision might as well close up shop now and save us the garbage.

Big Biz Tycoon! Has a simple storyline. Your character - a green haired anime style dork wins 100k in the local lottery. You decide to start a business.

Graphics

Graphics? What graphics? These cheeseball graphics would play well on a 486. There are no resolution adjustments, so you get to play at 640x480. This coupled with the resolution issue in Windows 2k and Windows XP makes for a stabbing headache within seconds of starting the game. All the characters are drawn in an Anime style - considering the company that produced the game is called Animedia, this isn't a surprise. Everything is low quality. From the textures to the colors, everything is either blurry or has more jagged edges than a handsaw. But hey, the colors are bright!

Sound

The sound in this game sucks. From the little computer generated grunts of your employees to the MIDI music that plays way too loudly. I mean, come on! It takes 5 minutes to create sounds like these. They aren't even trying!

Gameplay

Gameplay is where this title refuses to shine. Lets start with the manual. Oh, wait. THERE ISN'T ONE. Inside the box is the CD in a slipcover, and a two page installation guide. From the cryptic buttons - Office Management is how you clean the office - to the obviously bad translations of error messages; this title has nothing going for it. To give you an idea: what does "Applicable to at least project level 3" mean? The game, thankfully, includes a tutorial. Of course the tutorial is useless. You don't get to learn the controls yourself, you get to watch the cursor go to and click on things. Fast. The tutorial lasts about 2 minutes, yet is able to build an office, start a project, hire employees, finish a project, distribute and sell your product, make your character play golf... Get the point? Unless you have a photographic memory or a MANUAL, you are screwed. While playing the game, your employees complain about everything. Especially that it's too cold or too hot in the office. But there is no indicator as to what you can do to fix the heat or cold issue because of the lack of manual and lack of decent tutorial. One interesting thing is that you see the magic hand rotate objects in the tutorial, but you don't seem to have the ability yourself, unless it's hidden in the manual somewhere. Last but not least, every tycoon game you can play lets you pause the game and take a look around. Not this one. If you pause the game, then touch the keyboard or click the mouse on anything and you unpause.

This game has no multiplayer capabilities. It does have a menu choice for it, though.

Conclusion

This game sucks. If you buy it you are dull. Geez I wish I could take it back...